Increasing Perceived Value

October 14, 2014

Perceived value is created not just by the price that is charged for something, but by a number of other factors, too.

In my previous post, I wrote about what perceived value is and how important it is to believe in your product’s value. HOW you portray that belief to others is very important, it’s not just writing a figure on a price tag, you need to create an impression of value which lives up to the monetary figure you are quoting.

For example

I looked up the prices that others charge for their prints and found that an 8×10 print in a frame goes for anything from $120 to $250 – and can even go higher if the artist is well known.

$250 for one print! That seems like a lot of money.

If I think about it, I can believe that my work is worth it. Certainly the amount of time and money I put in to taking my shots makes them worth something and I’m pretty sure my photo’s are aesthetically pleasing – but how do I go about convincing other people of that.

Well, the first thing is having the guts to ask for the money. I have to be able to look someone in the eye and tell them with confidence that a print is worth $250, or they’re never going to be convinced.

Almost as important as that is the presentation. No matter where you are or what you’re selling, you can always do something to improve your presentation, which will increase its perceived value.

The Taste The Arts art fair was on a closed-off street in the middle of town. My booth was a 10×10 pop-up tent set up over the road markings of what was normally a parking spot. Before the event, I put a lot of thought into how I could decorate and use that space to portray professionalism and value.

Here’s what I came up with:

I gave my 10×10 booth the theme of being an art gallery. Inside the ‘gallery’ I tried to brand everything with what I created as being the ‘Peter Pollock Photography’ brand.

I picked my color scheme and tried to stick to it throughout the booth.

I bought a large table cloth for $10 to completely cover my display table, covering up its unsightly legs and the boxes I had stored under it.

Everything I printed, from posters to name tags to price tags, were done in my brand’s color scheme – and my brand’s font.

To give the booth a feeling of stepping off of the street and into a gallery, I bought two area rugs for $20 each to lay down on the floor. These rugs changed the way the street felt under-foot and created a separation between the street and my space (of course, the rugs fitted with my color scheme).

I then made sure that I kept the area clean and tidy, no trash, water bottles or food to be seen, just a gallery displaying my valuable art.

The whole thing worked together really well and created an environment which added some perceived value of its own to my art.

The visitors ‘stepped in’ to my gallery and were given a whole experience which encouraged them to perceive my work as valuable.

Basically I tried to make sure there was nothing that would challenge the perception that my prints were worth $250 each.

Whether you are trying to sell a product, your time, your writing ability or whatever it may be, value it highly, aim high and make sure that in all your communication, be it verbal or nonverbal, you don’t give them any reason to doubt your assessment of that value.

Allow them to perceive it as being valuable and don’t give them cause to think otherwise!

About PeterP

I am a blogger, author, stay at home dad, speaker, web hosting trainer and geek (I was so excited to get an iPad that I actually made up a song and dance about it). I am English by birth, but currently live in California with my wife and our three children.
I ran a web hosting business for nine years and found that many, if not most of my clients had never learned how to use any of the functions associated with hosting so I wrote a book to try and teach just those skills.
I must admit to having fallen in love with WordPress (possibly a little TOO much) and I honestly find it hard to understand why anyone would use anything different to build a site! WordPress is wonderful!
My passion is to help others achieve their goals with their websites/blogs. I believe that, with a little help, anyone can have an awesome site.